ভূমিকা

Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books Adab as-Salat: The Disciplines of the Prayer Second Revised Edition Section Seven: The Obstacles And Barriers Preventing Being Benefited By The Qur’an Now that the greatness of the Book of Allah has been understood by considering all the required aspects of greatness, and the way of being benefited by it has been opened, it will be necessary for the learner of, and the benefit-deriver [ mustafīd ] from, the Book of Allah to apply a further important discipline in order to get [the best] advantage.

It is removing the causes which prevent the advantage, and which we call “the veils” between the benefit-deriver and the Qur'an. These veils are many, to some of which we shall refer presently. One of these thick veils is self-conceit, through which the learner sees himself, because of this veil, in no need of getting any benefit from the Qur'an.

This is one of Satan's important masterpieces, by which he always tries to inspire man with imaginary perfections, telling him to be contented with what he has, and to disregard everything other than that which he already has.

For example, he makes the people of tajwīd [reciting the Qur'an with intonation] contented with this small knowledge which they have, making it quite big in their eyes, slighting other knowledge to them, and making them compare the carriers of the Qur'an with themselves, causing them to be deprived of understanding the luminous divine Book and of getting any advantage from it.

Similarly, he causes the men of letters to be contented with the meaningless from making them believe that all the Qur'anic affairs are only those that they have. He engages the exegetes, as usual, with the ways of recitation, the different opinions of the linguistics, the times of revelation, the occasions of revelation, whether the āyah was revealed in Mecca or in Medina, the number of the āyah s, their letters and the like.

The scholars are also kept indulged in only learning the different aspects of indications, the diverse ways of arguments and the like. Even the philosopher, the wise man and the gnostic are imprisoned by Satan behind the thick veil of terminology, concepts and so on.

The benefit-deriver [ mustafīd ] must tear open these veils in order to look at the Qur'an from behind them, taking care not to stay at any one of these veils, so as not to be left behind the caravan of the travelers to Allah, nor be deprived of the sweet divine invitations.